Once, Zayn was invited to the home of a kind old couple. The old man was blind, his wife deaf and mute, and they had an unusually…hungry dog. On his visit, he burst through their door, broke their old TV, stole their keepsakes, and even ate the dog food himself.

  — System Admin 007, who swears this was not made up.

  ***

  Northwalker: How the hell did you end up inside the shattered abyss? -_-*

  Zayn had the same question. One moment, he was trying to light a fire; the next moment, he was in the fire. One could say he'd been cooked without oil.

  Breathing the ashen smell, he swept his gaze around the ashen forest. Black ichor traced the land beneath his gaze, spilling out of the cracks in the land. The bloodline within him twisted and churned like a living thing.

  If he stopped the skill, would he return to reality? It didn’t seem that simple this time.

  Northwalker: No one walks into the shattered abyss doing nothing. This is not an eatery; you can’t just open the door and walk in. Run me through the whole thing.

  Weren’t you watching? Then he found the answer to that question by himself. Nobody had time to watch him all day, even if his benefactor really was a basement dweller.

  Thankfully, the system did have an option for manual texting. Otherwise, if he had to speak aloud, all the “tumour-eyes” would snap open. Even if he didn’t turn into a flesh tendril then, he was very likely to be screwed over.

  He typed it all away, going through the events from yesterday night— how the treants surrounded him, the swarm mother, and his attempts at trying to understand fire.

  Northwalker: Unless you had burnt the entire jungle down, there was no way you’d have understood an aspect of fire like that.

  You'd not believe it, actually. He raised his hand in defeat and shuffled forward, walking out of the mist. He felt like he’d somehow sneaked into an unfriendly neighborhood. And now…he was having to call backup to save him.

  Only, his ‘backup’ was being wildly unhelpful…as usual.

  Northwalker: But the general idea is correct. Many in the greater universe expose their children to altered environments to push them to gain desired affinities. But what does that have to do with you being in the abyss?

  He explained the rest with great patience—how he failed to make the fire, and how every time it shifted into more dangerous experiments, and how he thought that had led to him being there.

  Northwalker: Put more points in Intelligence from now on.

  Zayn stared at the text, feeling the veins in his forehead bulge. In the end, he swallowed his grievances and walked into the ashen forest.

  To him, it was the third, goth brother of the day and night forests. Or rather, this was perhaps the real forest, while the two were the facade, created by the system.

  Muscles drawn tight, he trudged deeper, the burnt stench souring the back of his throat. He hesitated, debating whether to stop ‘I See You Now’.

  Without it, it was too easy to be lost and sneak-attacked, but having it active meant he was a walking beacon. Easier to detect.

  Burnt black leaves crumbled underneath his feet, giving off a cracking noise. His muscles quivered. He placed every step carefully, trying not to wake them.

  Northwalker: The good news is…you are not inside the shattered abyss.

  “What?!” He spurted out, nearly waking the trees up completely. Then, he typed again, “What’s this curse about then? This forest—”

  Northwalker: You’re not inside, but you are at the doorstep, on the edge. It should be some lingering pocket dimension created by some greater being of the Shattered Abyss. Meaning, you can still return.

  “How?”

  Northwalker: That is for you to find out. There’s a saying in the greater universe—The System is the guide and the solution. If there was a way to get in, there is a way to get out.

  Zayn frowned. Northwalker might as well have told him to ‘pray to the gods and repent’ instead of something incomprehensible like this.

  Fine. Even this was fine. He would find the way out all by himself.

  He was used to doing things all by himself.

  ***

  “If I don’t stare, they won’t stare back. If I don’t stare, I won’t see them stare back.” Zayn mentally told himself as he crabbed through the forest. Maximum distance he kept from the ashen, burnt trees while he attempted to find his way out.

  Most of the trees were lethargic, ignoring his existence unless he woke them up. Undeads were creatures of the night, so it made sense that they weren’t jumping around to catch him during the day.

  Still, sometimes, whenever he’d snap a branch or two under his feet without noticing, those weeping eyes would prop open, glaring at him with a mix of hunger, madness, and ridicule. His hair, face, and even his balls were slick with sweat from the constant tension.

  To divert himself, he put his attention into something else.

  ‘I See You Now’ upgrade options available!

  For a while, the notification kept floating in front of his eyes, and he’d been stuck between the upgrade choices.

  I see you (Initiate): Track your opponents in even more detail, gaining the ability to pin and monitor them from afar. Improves the detection capabilities of ‘I see you now’.

  Requirements: Use ‘I see you now’ to stalk a single opponent for more than a minute. (0/3)

  I see you, but you don’t (Initiate): Your opponents no longer sense your gaze unless you stare too long, or they’re much more powerful than you. Removes the taunting ability of ‘I see you now’.

  Requirements: Use ‘I see you now’ to spy on someone. (4/10)

  He really did like the second option. Fewer things were more awkward than being caught staring, so this one drawback would be nice to get rid of.

  Now you see me (Initiate): Your opponents will feel your gaze ever more intensely, incapable of ignoring you even if they wished to. Improves the taunting abilities of ‘I see you now’.

  Requirements: Use I see you now to gain undivided attention from someone for more than 1 minute. (21783/10).

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  Requirements met!

  It took him fourteen business days to figure out why the number had ballooned so high. It was the friggin' treants. Of course, he had their undivided attention the entire night. Those pesky things.

  Pass. The entire world is looking to screw me over anyway, so why would I need to taunt?

  I see mana (Initiate): See through the intricacies of the mana, gleaning more understanding about mana types and the law that governs them. Improves the mana seeing capabilities of ‘I see you now’.

  Requirement: Understand a fundamental truth of mana. (2/1)

  I see through it (Initiate): See through walls, illusions, and the deception of the world. Improves the ciphering capabilities of ‘I see you now’.

  Requirement: Unveil the truth of the world. (1/1)

  Now, these two options had him in a bind.

  Understanding mana principles and logic was critical for him, personally. He really wanted to get experimenting, mess with their logic, and learn more about how the world interacted with mana.

  But ‘I see through it’ had practical value for the world and the dungeon he was in. Right now. In this harrowing place, it might be exactly what he needed to get out, and even after that, he would always need this kind of skill to see through disguises.

  So, he made his choice.

  ‘I see you now’(Apprentice) has evolved to ‘I see through it’(Initiate)!

  Surviving today was more important than becoming a master of mana tomorrow. And he’d have more opportunities down the line…as long as he lived.

  He looked around and mentally commanded to activate his skill.

  Without warning, his eyes clamped onto the mana in his circuit, forcing it to surge forward in a storm. A pinlike pain pricked his eyes, and he was forced to close them.

  When he opened it again, the surroundings changed subtly.

  Beyond the blackened world of ichor and tumorous eyes, another layer was peeled off, revealing the world beneath.

  He noticed new patterns, traces of past battles, cuts on the ground, step marks, and dragging marks across the ground. Signs of war littered the ground, as if all of it were remembered by the land. And every minute, finer details emerged.

  The broken cracks also began to connect to a more unified pattern, joining at different nodes, leading somewhere.

  Huh?

  It was really hard to notice unless he looked very carefully. And no offense, he’d not been doing much ‘looking around’. He’d been doing his best not to be ‘looked at’.

  Following the traces, he found himself closing onto a large clearing, where no trees grew for hundreds of meters. The earth here was depressed, as if a colossal claw gouged the earth out.

  A strange heat wafted out of here, and he felt Verdant Skin grow as he closed in and peeked down.

  Careful, he avoided the ichor. He had Minor Curse resistance, which was sufficient, but he didn’t want to test his limits right now. He headed down the slanted slope. Until he saw the great crack, splitting the land with cracks that were wider than him and had no…end.

  His mind was sent whirling. What kind of man or beast could have caused such a great shattering on the earth? Or was it a skill? Something awesome and destructive like Summon Meteor?

  Not long after, he found his answer. Signs were etched into the land. Sigils, diagrams, and symbols, each cracked, each carrying an ancient heat.

  Finally, the system erupted with a line of words.

  ??? - Part of an eroded mana circle.

  Only a part.

  Numerous such sigils and circles covered the depression. And lines that connected them to each other into a single whole. Zayn stared at the middle, where everything connected onto a single, large, shattered space—like someone had punched a mirror.

  He looked in.

  There, nothing but an abyssal dark resided.

  A hollow darkness.

  As he peered, his eyes sucked in more mana, draining his reserves until only one-third was left. A line of words appeared on his screen.

  ‘I see through it’ has seen through ‘???’!

  Extinction Circle - Remnant of a flame-based mana circle—at least a few millennia old. It holds an immense amount of blazing mana inside.

  He just stood there and looked down, his hand on his chin, trying to make sense of the circle from high up. So that was the new feature? Kinda neat.

  His eyes were glued to the middle of the shattering once more. There was nothing but a void. An empty, dark space.

  The vibe it gave off was repulsive, like a hunger, a hunger that made one devour flesh, sinew, and blood, brain and grey matter whole. A hunger that existed before mouth and desire, before existence itself, whispering between every hollow atom. A hunger that was almost devilishly holy—

  ‘Undying cockroach’ is resonating with you!

  A stubborn will roared back at the hunger, snapping him out of it. Horrified, he stared at his own forearm. Blood welled from the torn flesh, writhing as it tried to seal itself shut. The taste of something soft was still stuck in his mouth.

  He'd bitten off a chunk of his own flesh.

  Ding! Feat unlocked!

  Peeked in abyss (Silver): You can’t keep getting away with this! You can’t stare into the abyss and just walk off!

  Effect: +4 fortitude.

  ***

  As he moved on, he noticed more gouged depressions in the earth. Each of them was shattered, connected to the abyss. It slowly dawned on him that none of these would lead back to reality.

  Though he wasn’t too worried, he was busy doing something else altogether.

  Black Pauldron (Degraded - Iron): A shoulder protector belonging to a Black raven. It was crafted with the bones of Night Ravens, forged to be indestructible, giving the Black Raven of the Fae a fearsome reputation.

  Grinning, he put the pauldron on. The blackness of it contrasted well with his red suit. He almost began thinking it wasn’t too bad to have landed here.

  This place was a treasure trove.

  Even treading the abyss was worth it if there was something of value to be gained.

  One after another, he 'recovered' more and more pieces of armour. Most of them were too big for him to wear, but some of them suited him just fine, particularly the pieces of armour belonging to the Black Ravens. He was practically grinning from ear to ear at this point.

  Eventually, he found another piece of hollowfang, held by a tree. As though it held onto its last keepsake. It was in a much better condition than the one he had on him. The problem was, its grip was too strong.

  No matter how much he tried to pull it out, the root refused to let go.

  Frowning, he let go of the weapon. Not because he pitied the tree. There was something inside the trees—flashing with a hint of light. No, he’d not gone mad.

  There really was a light flashing inside the trees.

  Almost imperceptible if one didn't look inside.

  Proving it wasn’t just his delusion, a line of words that popped up.

  ??? - Crystals that hold one memory of the treants.

  Within the trunk of the tree, thin lines of mana converged into crystalline shapes, twinkling like stars in the void. His eyes pulled on the mana again, nearly draining him this time around.

  The skill expanded to give him another line of description.

  Memory crystals - Due to their intense desire not forget their roots, tears of the Fae have crystallized to carry their memories. Stores a single memory from the time they were alive.

  “Huh?”

  For the next few minutes, he was hung up on whether to put his hands into the hornet's nest or not. It was all but confirmed that the moment he tried to retrieve it, the entire forest would go apeshit.

  But it was also true they weren’t moving around much, so the danger wasn’t imminent. He’d tried to agitate them a couple of times—like intentionally stepping on branches and roots to catch their attention, but what they did was snap their eyes open at him like an angry grandpa before sleeping once more.

  Even if they could come out and become their nighttime form, they would be weaker, and surely, they couldn’t do it in vast numbers.

  Fuck it.

  A vine snuck out of his hand, Entangle forging a chain with a three-fingered claw on its end. He crept low, pale-faced as he extended the chain-claw towards the nearest tree of horror.

  Smiling through clenched jaws, he moved closer, muscles in his face rebelling. He was someone who had rushed fearlessly at Stone ape—a colossal creature capable of swatting him like a fly. These pesky things were nothing in front of it.

  They could barely cut his skin.

  Why was he acting like a wuss? Because of the eyes?

  These weren't the same as the ones in his nightmares. Even if they were, why should he care? He wasn’t the same Zayn who lived his life wallowing in his nightmares, unable to sleep at night.

  He had changed.

  The claw swam towards the burnt tree, struggling to stay in form due to his faltering concentration. He did his best keep it upright. Making an extra attempt not wake the treants up.

  As the claw touched the ashen back, his lungs froze. Because all the weeping eyelids on the tree snapped open at the same time, staring at him.

  Claws stretching faster than he intended, he grabbed the crystal and pulled it out in one swift motion.

  Out of reflex, he also shot a red bolt into the claw, a crimson lightning of mana—bigger than anything he’d ever summoned. It tore into the ashen tree, striking it like divine thunder.

  Crackle

  The tree cracked upon impact. Red mana spread like a fire, shattering its body into dust. The air stank of burnt, rotten corpse left too long in the sun.

  The entire forest woke up.

  All the gazes stared at him with weeping, pained gazes. Then they laughed. A cacophony of whispers and jeers reverberated through the ashen forest.

  One of the nearby trees split apart, its roots twisting into a humanoid shape. Zayn knew what was happening, and he was dead tired of playing on the backfoot. Without hesitation, he shot out another bolt at it.

  Crackle

  It shattered into dust and ruin, into nothingness.

  “Who wants to go next?!” His roar overpowered the jeers, turning the trees silent. Mana, scarlet, crackling on his body. “I am not the new prisoner who walked in here! I am the warden who’ll fucking raze this forest to the ground!”